May 24, 2007

Inside Brookhaven Obesity Clinic

I have a new addiction, I have to confess. Luckily, it is not related to alcohol or food. It is related to a great TV show. It is called “Inside Brookhaven Obesity Clinic”. What a great, well done and addictive program. This program should be an inspiration to get serious about losing weight. These patients are severely morbidly obese and some are on the edge of death. They have significant health problems, (some of them you would never imagine where related to being obese) and most can't even walk.

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INSIDE BROOKHAVEN IS A GREAT SHOW ARE YOU KIDDING ME? IN WHAT PART OF THE SHOW DID YOU SEE THIS WONDERFUL EATING PROGRAM? THE PERSON IN CHARGE OF THE DIET WAS FIRED FROM HER LAST JOB. AND WHERE ARE THE PEOPLE WHO DID WELL ON THIS GREAT PROGRAM? I DID NOT SEE THEM? SOMEONE NEEDS TO REALLY LOOK INTO THIS MUCH LIES

how do we contact brookhaven? what does it take to get in! im 52 at 415 lbs and need help and can hardly breath and cannot walk that great , have diabetis etc etc. PLEASE HELP, I DONT WANT TO DIE.........

Did you see the slop they were feeding those people? It was the worst overprocessed institutional looking food I have ever seen. I've seen school lunches that looked more appetizing. No one is going to get healthy eating that food. No wonder they cheat and order out. They need to get inovative and maybe have guest chefs, like students from a culinary school come in and teach these people how to prepare fresh healthy meals, so they can take that skill home with them. Plus they would be eating quality fresh food that tasted good and they would be less inclined to cheat.

I love watching this program. It's an inspiration for me to keep on top of my own health. I was once near 240, but got serious about my weight. I'm down almost 40lbs. now and off those Cancer drugs.
My problem is, why do they keep putting up with Dennis when it doesn't seem that he wants to get with the program and really try to lose weight.
What is it that Brookhaven is missing? It seems like they would send him to a convalescent home to die!
Why do you let them "cheat"? It defeats the purpose of your programs, doesn't it?

I'm not sure if it's the procedures that need changing or the program itself. If there are certain people who keep going back to their old habits, then that tells me they do "not" want to get better!! All the therapy in the world isn't going to get them to their goal weights if they've made up their minds not to follow the program or advice.
Who pays for it in the end.. they do!!!

I saw on one episode that they don't kick the cheaters out cause if they go home they will surely die and the administrator does not want another death on his conscience. In the past he has sent people home that cheated and they have died. I think he is feels stuck they are to sick to even help themselves. What I would like to see is perhaps a fine to the staff that is helping them sneak the food in. Most of the cheaters are the ones that can not even get out of bed so someone has to be bringing that food to there bedside.

I am writing because I would like to know how to go about calling the Hospital and reaching the obesity clinic for possible consideration to be admitted. I am 37 years old and I am over 300lbs. I have struggled with my weight since I have been a child and I am in desperate need for a weight loss/exercise program. I have respiratory problems, sleep apnea and difficulty with my joints, which makes it difficult to walk at times for long periods of time. I have back problems and I am desperate for help. I watch your show weekly and feel that the hospital would be a great way for me to learn how to take control over my own actions and put into place a new lifestyle that I can continue at home once I have mastered the in patient program. Please e-mail me with the number in which I can contact someone who will be able to help me with the beginning process of possible consideration for your program.

I don't understand the point of the clinic. There are no regulations and consequences to people cheating and bringing in junk food. How does that help the patients that are there to truly lose weight. It's no better than being at home with family members that bring home a gallon of ice cream. I also would like to know who pays for this? If these patients are too heavy to work, then is the clinic funded by state aid. If so, then the state needs to step in because I think it's a very good scam they've got going there.

I would love to know to how to get in contact with Brookhaven. There are a lot of us who need alittle help, so kick the cheaters out and fill the beds with those of us who want to change how we eat and think, people who WANT to change their lives. People want to see success stories not someone who wants to cheat and thinks its ok to do so. HELP THOSE WHO WANT TO BE HELPED!

"What is it that Brookhaven is missing? It seems like they would send him to a convalescent home to die!"

My heart breaks for these people, for all desperate people addicted and in bondage. For the ones who cry out, feel pain so intense they have hid themselves under addiction, you see that is me, not as heavy, not as confined physically, but emotionally this addiction controls and ruins my life. There is hope, I can tell you what this show is missing. Jesus Christ. Only He knows the root cause for each and every single addiction whether it is food, drugs, sex or alcohol. Name your destructive force and Jesus is your answer. He will lead you through your journey to freedom. We all have hurts, pains and past experiences that are crippling us. We need Him, we were created by Him for Him and we have strayed and left to our accord we have miserably failed. Just look at society and you will see how we struggle with many many demons.
I too watched the program last night, God led me to watch it as I never watch TV. I too was so touched by the concern for these individuals and was driven into prayer for them. But the truth is this: They need Jesus, His powerful blood that can break every yoke. The question is what would drive a person to eat like this, I am certain no one has the desire to be that heavy, to be so controlled. The root cause is different for everyone. Only Jesus knows your past and your secrets and only He can fill those painful hurts will His love instead of food. Will power and human love cannot do it, sure it may work for a time, but the love of Jesus is permanent and forever. I too am a food addict, failed so many times on dieting and even since becoming born again as I learn the truth about God, His precious son and the power of His name and His blood. I do not know how to conjure up the will power to stay on a diet, but I do know daily I throw myself on Jesus and He is leading me through my past, to the center of the hurt, to the start of my addiction. Layer by layer as I allow, and only as I allow He will peel them off, cleanse you and free you from it all!! Praise the Lord - no clinic in the world can offer that. There is no quick fix. You have to make Jesus your Lord, your master and allow Him to change you, slowly from the inside out. I know He will fix help me change habit and become the Holy temple He calls me to be. He can truly fill every need anyone has, no matter how lost you may feel – He came for the sick and brokenhearted, he came to set the captives free. He bought you back from the world and loves you more than you can contain. Do you know Jesus? Allow Jesus to come into your life, allow Him access to you pain. Only He knows why drives us all and only He can fix it, truly fix it.
Please hear me, if anyone would like to talk about a relationship with Jesus and how we can journey this journey together I would love to hear from you. I cannot offer you a diet, a plan or an immediate answer, but I can offer you a lifeline - Jesus. I would love to email anyone and share my faith and help in any way as God leads me. My email is DebRNinNY@aol.com. I thank you for allowing m the opportunity to express my feelings. I pray that this message touches your heart and you reach out to whom can truly help you.

Then Peter said, "Silver or gold I do not have, but what I have I give you. In the name of Jesus Christ of Nazareth, walk." Acts 3:6

I initially thought that I was just writing this to repond regarding what other people had written in this forum. Gradually, though, I began to understand that I was really writing this to myself and about myself. You see, I too have not been successful in losing weight. :(

I have knowledge necessary to lose weight, but have not been able to put it to work.

Obviously I am choosing to ignore the facts so - early death awaits me.

It seems my motto must be "Let me stuff something in my face and I can ignore the whole world and ignore the fact that - early death awaits me".

In truth all I have to do is delay food gratification 1 minute at a time.

That sounds easy but is horrendously hard.

I have to get focused onto something other than food.

This is not an easy task either. For some reason that I don't understand, I've chosen not to do that.

I guess I would rather wallow in the misery.

I must be getting a reward for being stuck and wallowing in misery or I wouldn't be doing it.

I am choosing to die by convincing myself that I am helpless when it comes to overeating food.

I guess it's safer to wallow and safer to die than it is to enter the world.

I can tell from your statements that most of you are not aware of what food addiction entails.

Like other addictions, relapse is an integral part of recovery from food addiction.

In all addictions, there are many relapses - it's a given. It's a natural part of recovery.

However food addiction has the one very important factor that other addictions don't.

In other addictions you can completely avoid what you are addicted to.

It is recommended that alcoholics completely avoid alcohol and never have even one drink.

Same thing for drugs, etc.

But food is different - you can't completely avoid it over a long period of time.

That factor alone makes recovery difficult.

Those addicted to food - like me, are totally preoccupied with it all day and all night. We are obsessed with it and compulsive about using it.

It's our best friend!

It's the easiest way we can get comfort.

I have read recently that there in food addiction there are changes in the brain similar to other addictions.

This is a very significant factor in why it is so difficult to lose weight and that it isn't just a matter of self control.

As in any addiction, you have to just keep trying.

If you fall down, pick yourself up and try again.

Maybe it will be the 2,005th try that will be the one where you make it.

That's not to say failing isn't horrid, and emotionally very painful. It is. But you and I have to get up and try again.

The only other choice is a significantly early death.

For me, many times it's difficult to even acknowledge that this is the case.

Any time I'm overeating I'm deliberately ignoring my early death from it.

Sometimes I think that is exactly what I want - death - at least a part of me does!

But saying that gives me an excuse not to try any longer--gives me an excuse to wallow in misery and eat.

I haven't found the solution to stopping myself from over eating.

The sad :( thing is that there is no magic wand that they can wave to cure our massive over eating. They can't do it for us.

Unless we can take the step to change our behavior, we die early.

Even surgery isn't necessarily a magic wand.

There is still a great deal of effort required to being successful even with surgery.

We have to be willing to give up food as an emotional resource.

That is what is most difficult for me and what seems to be most difficult for the massively obese people in this program.

It's not just giving up chewing and swallowing massive amounts of food. That alone is really a hard one for me.

More importantly it's giving up:

The comfort of food,

The anxiety alleviating effect of food,

The pacifying and relaxing effect of food.

And, Giving up the way food makes time pass more quickly, when we're stuck in bed or in a wheel chair.

And, giving up whatever else food "does" for us.

And, it's having to find another way to deal with our emotions, when eating solves everything.

In reality it is extremely destructive and is in the process of destroying me.

I am on the Titanic and am too frightened to take the jump that will get me into the life boat.

It's easier to stand here immobilized, and "go down with the ship".

Surgery can have serious side effects and isn't always successful.

What I hear in every successful case is that the people have refocused their food addiction (obsession with it and compulsion to over eat)into exercise and living so that food becomes a small part of their life rather than all of their life.

With surgery, I have read that -- at least right after surgery -- the focus becomes getting enough food into that 1 oz. pouch enough times a day just to survive.

And I guess they say you don't feel hungry. Yet there are people that defeat the surgery.

I would guess that success comes thru a lot of counseling and channeling the compulsive energy that is the need to eat into exercise and living and interacting with others.

The thing is, you can no longer reward yourself with food. An intermittent reward schedule is the most effective for maintaining a behavior. If I reward myself even once with food, it is extremely reinforcing for continuing to over eat.

Also, the thing is weight loss is a process, not necessarily a given. This is particularly true of the extremely morbidly obese. We do so much to defeat ourselves.

If just entering a hospital program would automatically result in changes in thinking and doing, these massively obese people wouldn't exist and I wouldn't be obese.

What I see in those in that hospital program who leave when they shouldn't is excessive self centeredness and a massive denial that is like a turtle's shell and obviously a tremendous need to protect themselves to the point that they are willing to die to stay safe in their shell.

Of course my view of this is colored by my own experiences.

It's like the doctor's are standing in front of people who are convinced that stabbing themselves in the heart with a big knife won't harm them--and that in fact doing this will make them feel much better.

The doctors can tell them to go home and stab themselves because they are deluded, or they can try to take the knife away and change their faulty thinking.

The reason that the doctors don't just tell them to get out when they can't make changes is because the whole thing isn't about exercise and decreased eating.

It's about altering faulty thinking, and for the doctors to have a chance to influence their faulty thinking, the patient has to be there.

When I saw that massively obese gentelman leaving the hospital, I knew it wasn't about the food. That was just an excuse - and any excuse would have worked.

Looking at him, I saw a little boy who was screaming, I'm not safe. I won't hear you because I'ts not safe. I'm going away because It's not safe to hear you. I have to ignore you to be safe.

And that faulty thinking may kill him.

Maybe like the gentleman who weighed 1,000 lbs and lost to 540 and left and then came back, maybe this massively obese man will find it safe enough to do at a later date - if he doesn't die first.

I hurt, and I know many of you must from your comments.

If there is anyone who would be interested in forming a discussion group about our experiences and issues with losing massive amounts of weight, leave a note in this forum.

My wife and I saw the tv segment of people at this clinic who cheat and order out fast food. We are not sure, but suspect all or most of the patients in this clinic are probably on welfare or getting funds for being disabled. If this is the case, then strict rules as to who can stay to get treatment should be the order of the day. After all, who really pays for the person who is not productive and finds contentment in eating 3+ meals a day and having someone else wipe their ass for them! Easy work if you can find it, hey?